General Information
During the year 2000 D J Clark built a visual record of the Lancaster &
Morecambe district using photographs and information submitted by those that
feature in the pictures. The project was conducted in association with Lancaster
Museum and has been archived for future generations to look back at the district
at the turn of the new Millennium. For more information on the project visit
the information page. If you find a caption is
wrong or there is a fault with the page please e-mail D
J Clark.
Date:
December 8th, 2000
Location: St Martins College
Photographer's Diary
Friday 8th December St Martins College
This had been a surprisingly hard one to set up. My contact, the equal opportunities
officer in the Student Union, Heather Tattersall was very difficult to get hold
of. I did in the end and set up to arrive at 11 AM. We started by a formal tour
and I shot numerous pictures of teaching, eating, studying etc. The day was
so bad I was forced to run between buildings, my umbrella, blown out on the
first venture. We wandered and Heather loosened up. We had originally planned
a day in the life of Heather, but this proved impractical as she was not doing
anything of great interest.
The highlight was the student accommodating. We approached a young man in the
canteen, who without thinking handed over his keys. Arriving at his flat we
were faced by the cleaners who begged us not to enter his room. We did and saw
a barely visible floor and all the trimmings of a typical male student flat.
I finished the day with the promise of returning on three separate trips. One
to photograph the college, it was too wet this day. Two for the sports and thirdly
for a Kareoke night on Tuesday.
Arriving at the Kareoke night an hour late, the judges were in position, the
build up done and the first act ready to walk on to stage. I was hoping for
a moody student Union shot, but was amazed by what was to unfold. The first
act, a young obviously drunk man, took to the stage and while singing to the
music, went on to remove all his clothing. I was wondering what it was I had
come to photograph, but was happy to get such extreme images. At the end of
the song, I questioned the DJ "is this normal" - "the first time
for me, he said, I've seen tits before but never a full frontal".
I waited to photograph more contestants but all were shy and looked at the screen,
so I left after half an hour in the hope that I had something strong from contestant
number one.
I finished the story with a trip up to college on Friday to photograph the buildings
in the sun. I was struck by the view of Lancaster and actually ended up spending
more time photographing the castle, than the college. This was the last day
of term and students were obviously leaving. I wandered the grounds looking
professional and stopping to take the odd photograph.